“Did you see it?”

“No, but I saw the trailer, though.”

“Oh, my God, his voice acting was so awful.”

“It really was, to be honest.” She snickered with a slight snort, and the rest of the table laughed.

“Well, aren’t you just the cutest thing around the barn?”

“Shut the fuck up!” She laughed again, the rest of the table roaring along.

The lunchroom gushed with conversation, obnoxious and quiet kids adding flavor in every corner.

“Ilene, here look at this.”

Four kids sat at a small table near the corner – two boys and two girls. Ilene, a slim girl with pale blonde hair and a light ovular face, peeked over at her friend Vena’s phone. One braid was wrapped around her head and her blue eyes reflected the sheen of the screen, mouth contorting to a stifled smirk.

“Fuck, I shouldn’t laugh at that…” She covered her mouth as Vena giggled.

“Ah, you got to love race memes.”

“Oooh, let me see,” Daniel said, a twin to his brother, Philip. Both had chestnut hair, bowl-cut, thin faces, brown eyes, and faded pimple marks on their skin, dressed in different colored polo shirts.

Philip snickered. “Danny is a closet-racist, in case you guys didn’t know.”

“Makes sense,” Vena said. She was petite, short ginger hair and sky-blue eyes, with freckles on her tanned cheeks and nose. “He just has that ‘send-em-back-where-they-came-from’ look.”

Philip looked up from his food. “You… you know we look exactly alike, right?”

Vena nodded. “I know.”

Danny chortled while Philip shook his head. “Know what? Fuck y’all.”

The table shared another laugh, before Vena stopped suddenly and sniffed at the air. “Something’s coming, I can feel it… Yes, yes… Something wicked this way comes…” She rolled her eyes before she pointed past Ilene at the boy approaching.

“Oh, shut up,” Ilene said. “That’s my boyfriend, not a fucking tyrant.”

“Close enough.”

Ilene sprung from her seat and hurried to him, kissing him sweetly. He returned it stiffly, leaning down a bit, being taller. He was also lean, curly black hair, fair skin. He wore a black shirt and blue jeans, faded at the knees. His eyes were darker than his hair – unnaturally, like fire and ice occupying one space.

“Hello, Hayden!” Vena greeted with a thin smile and a wave.

Hayden nodded in her direction, neither smiling nor staying long with his stare. She rolled her eyes before sharing an annoyed look with her friends.

“Can I talk to you for a second?” he asked.

“Um…”

“Hey!” Vena called. “We were hanging out over-”

“That’s okay, Vena,” Ilene said with a small smile. “I’ll see you in French.”

She and Hayden walked to a quieter corner of the room, leaving the table looking among themselves with a shrug and a shake of the head.

“How was your day?” she asks as they sit at a small, empty table across the room. Beside them at another table, students threw food at each other childishly, others recording with the phones. One such girl, one who was recording, glanced at Hayden. She had long reddish-brown hair tied into a ponytail, a round face, large oak-colored eyes, and big round glasses over them. She smiled to herself, her lingered stare unnoticed by the couple.

He looked away from Ilene. “It was fine.”

“Is, uh, something wrong?”

“Here, I wrote something for you.”

“Another poem?! Oh my God!

‘Mockingbird Songs:’

A morning is an awakening of the spirit,

Something that calls for a slumber we can’t understand.

I couldn’t understand the birds outside, why they do as they do.

What drives such things to be as they are, that exist

In such a fragile state as so? I think this, then breathe.

Then, I remember you. Like the breath I breathed

I remember you.

How can I forget? Never could I. As the morning

Calls to the hummingbirds to mate it

And the blueness of the sky to meet it

So too do I call you, sweet Ilene, to meet my lips

And know this home I call my heart.’

“Aw, this is so sweet. Thank you, Hayden.”

He nodded at her, face casted downward. Her smile slowly faded.

“What’s wrong?”

“You know, I overhead a bit of your conversation with your friends.”

“Oh, yeah, we were just playing around. Vena was showing me a lowkey racist meme, but other than that, it was pretty chill.”

Hayden chuckled. “No, I don’t mean the tone. I meant… I remember, a week or two ago, I opened up to you, telling you how I felt before… about that thing.”

“Oh… Right, I’m-I’m sorry. I remember that…”

“It just makes me feel like something is wrong with the way I speak that you won’t speak like that, you know?”

She kept her eyes steeled on the paper, running her thumbs up and down the page. “Well, you know, it’s hard to speak all proper- I mean, to speak properly… and stuff.”

“I realize about your upbringing. It just makes me uncomfortable, that’s all. I can try to get over it, but-”

“No, no, it’s okay, no, I-I get it. I’ll try my best.” She gave him a half-smile.

Hayden grinned before leaning forward over the table. She rose with him and they shared a kiss.

Returning to her own table, Ilene began packing her bag, avoiding eye contact.

Vena smiled at her. “Hey, look, I found another one. Jesus, it’s fucking brutal.”

“Oh, I appreciate it, but I’ll decline for now. Class is going to begin soon.”

“Huh?”

R-r-r-ing!

“Talk soon, okay?” She strapped the backpack around herself and walked out of the lunchroom. Once again, her friends looked among themselves, confusion painted.

Hayden sat against a tombstone in a graveyard, a small book in his hand and his phone on his lap. The sunset morphed the sky, soft winds blowing the wilted leaves.

Buzz!

He flipped it over, scoffing at the message.

@Ilene| Hey, baby. What’s up? How are you?

He breathed in the air and glanced at the sky, before typing back: I’m sitting at a graveyard right now.

@Ilene| A graveyard? Why?

@Hayden| Have you ever thought about death? Because I ponder death constantly. Not in a morbid way, but in a reflective way. Where do we go? What does it mean? Why does it matter? These things keep my mind grounded, endlessly influenced by the things I’m surrounded by.

@Ilene| You’re so profound babe, it’s really inspiring how you think.

@Hayden| Thanks. I don’t know, I think this is my nature and what has and will be my state for years to come. Anyway, I have to return home. Talk soon, I love you.

@Ilene| I love you too, talk soon

@Ilene| *.

Hayden cracked a slight smile. He switched it off, flipping open the picture book. He sighed as he stared and ran his fingers across the pages. Another wind blew, and the trees ruffled, grinding lightly against their own leaves. The sun disappeared – the trees shook harder.